Compared to March 2012, both sales and inventories are up, but inventories' 4.7% increase outstrips sales' 1.3% bump.

To understand the rate at which goods are being made and sold, economists compute an inventories/sales ratio. Since sales fell and inventories rose from February to March, the inventories/sales ratio also rose, from 1.19 to 1.21. This is the largest inventory/sales ratio recorded since the recovery began.